Identifying Instruments to Measure Programme Educational Objectives (PEO) Achievement in Malaysia

Abstract

Outcome Based Education (OBE) is required to be implemented in all academic programmes in Malaysia in order to fulfil the standards specified by the Malaysian Qualification Agency (MQA). One part of the OBE that needs to be measured is Programme Educational Objectives (PEOs). PEOs are broad statements that describe the expected achievement of graduates within three to five years of graduation. All institutions in Malaysia need to measure the PEOs. However, the PEOs of community colleges are not measured yet after five years of programme's implementation. Therefore, this paper systematically reviews the current instruments applied by community colleges in Malaysia to evaluate the programmes and identify the problems in the instruments. This survey study adopted triangulation approach where the data were collected from semi-structured interviews and document analysis. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with five officials from different divisions in the Department of Polytechnic and Community Colleges Education (JPPKK). These samples were purposively selected because their scope of the task was directly involved with the process of development and evaluation of the programme outcomes. Analysis of PEOs was also conducted to compare the PEOs of community college with eight local universities which are UKM, USM, UPM, UTM, UTHM, UTeM, UniMAP and UiTM. The analysis is based on PEOs of engineering or technology program from each institution. The results of this study identified four problems from the community college's instruments which are: (1) no specific measurement of PEOs, (2) unsuitable timeframe of data collection, (3) respondents' feedback is distracted by too many questions, and (4) lack of stakeholders' point of view. These results indicate that community colleges need the right instrument to measure the achievement of PEOs. Therefore, further research is suggested to study the instrument to measure the achievement of community college's PEOs.

Penilaian Pencapaian Objektif Pendidikan Program (PEO) Graduan Kolej Komuniti Sebagai Tenaga Kerja Berpengetahuan dan Berkemahiran

“…Dalam konteks Malaysia, PEO ialah kenyataan luas yang menggambarkan pencapaian jangkaan graduan dalam tempoh tiga hingga lima tahun tamat pengajian. Semua institusi di Malaysia perlu mengukur PEO (Hairi et al, 2019).…”

“…Amalan PEO telah diukur dalam konteks dalam dan luar negara seperti India (Jayaprakash, 2020;Rajak et al, 2019;Sundaram, 2015) Filipina (German et al, 2021), dan di Malaysia (Ab- Rahman et al, 2022;Hairi et al, 2019;Makinda et al, 2011;Pramono et al, 2020;Rahman et al, 2016). Literatur menunjukkan bahawa wujud keperluan bagi mengukur PEO bagi sesuatu program pengajian.…”

“…Literatur menunjukkan bahawa wujud keperluan bagi mengukur PEO bagi sesuatu program pengajian. Dalam konteks kolej komuniti di Malaysia, Hairi et al (2019) menjelaskan bahawa PEO kolej komuniti masih belum diukur selepas lima tahun pelaksanaan program. Ini menunjukkan bahawa pengukuran PEO memerlukan perhatian mendalam untuk diterokai terutama melibatkan program dengan pelbagai jenis bidang.…”